Bridges Weekly Trade News Digest • Volume 11 • Number 28 • 1st August 2007
Resources
HOW TO APPROACH THE MONITORING OF THE ACP-EU ECONOMIC PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENTS: AN OVERVIEW. By S. Bilal, F. Rampa, F. Jerosch, and D. Makhan. European Centre for Development Policy Management, 2007. The African, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) states and the European Union (EU) countries have agreed to negotiate new WTO-compatible Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs). These agreements should not be an end in themselves, but be first and foremost instruments for development. While these new free trade arrangements offer new development opportunities, they also pose considerable challenges for the ACP. To ensure that the development dimension of the EPAs is fulfilled, close monitoring - of both the negotiation and the implementation of these new partnership agreements - will be of prime importance. This InBrief presents a preliminary overview of some methodological issues linked to the design of a monitoring mechanism for the EPAs. The report is available at http://www.ecdpm.org/Web_ECDPM/Web/Content/Navigation.nsf/index2?readform&http://www.ecdpm.org/Web_ECDPM/Web/Content/Content.nsf/0/F311DF7D6853B9ECC12570D20036AC44
VAT, TARIFFS, AND WITHHOLDING: BORDER TAXES AND INFORMALITY IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES. By Michael Keen. The International Monetary Fund, July 2007. This paper explores the implications of a distinctive feature of the value added tax (VAT): that it functions, in part, as a tax on the purchases of informal operators from formal sector businesses and, not least, on their imports. The paper stresses the potential importance of the creditable withholding taxes that are levied by many developing countries. If both of these instruments are optimally deployed, it is shown, then the usual prescription that a small economy should not deploy tariffs remains valid even in the presence of an informal sector. A simple strategy is established for deploying these instruments so as to preserve government revenue and increase welfare in the face of efficiency-improving tariff cuts. The report is available at http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/wp/2007/wp07174.pdf.
INDICATORS FOR THE SELECTION OF SPECIAL PRODUCTS: SOME EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE. By the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development and the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation, July 2007. Most of the discussions so far on the selection of special products at the WTO have focused on the need to limit self-designation to a specific number or proportion of tariff lines. Existing proposals range from five individual tariff lines to 20 percent of all agricultural tariff lines.The FAO and ICTSD have conducted empirical research to try to shed light on the practical workings of the proposed special products mechanism. In particular, the organisations have undertaken country studies using a wide range of indicators, in an effort to help developing country governments identify the products that might most appropriately be designated as ’special’. The results of this experience are presented in this paper. The report is available at http://www.agtradepolicy.org/output/resource/ICTSD_FAO_Final.pdf.
THE ACP EXPERIENCE OF PREFERENCE EROSION IN THE BANANA AND SUGAR SECTORS: POSSIBLE POLICY RESPONSES TO ASSIST IN ADJUSTING TO TRADE CHANGES. By Paul Goodison. International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development, July 2007. The purpose of this paper is to situate the process of preference erosion in ACP-EU trade relations in the context of internal EU policy adjustments designed to prepare the EU agricultural and food products sector for trade liberalisation at the multilateral and bilateral levels. The paper seeks to analyse the sources and impacts of preference erosion on ACP banana and sugar sectors and reviews the experience of the EU policy response to the impact of preference erosion in ACP economies and societies. It also seeks to draw lessons from the various experiences of the policy response to preference erosion in the different circumstances faced in ACP countries. The paper is available at http://www.agtradepolicy.org/output/ictsd/goodison.pdf.